Rise of a Legend
by Funkyshnelpu jr
Summary: Virgil Wilson, taken from his family at the age of five to become a Spartan, will face the hardships of war and make a name for himself as he fights to survive Insurrectionists, the Covenant, ONI and eventually, his own sanity.


**AN: Here it is! The rewritten version of A Spartan's Exile! So...I decided that I will start at the abduction of the Spartan-II candidates instead of going with telling my OC's backstory in half assed flashbacks cause I didn't think to use stuff from **_**The Fall of Reach**_**. I thought 'You know what? Fuck it. I'll go use **_**The Fall of Reach**_**. It will probably help my story in the long run anyway.' So now I'm starting with the abductions. Most of this story will be taken from **_**The Fall of Reach **_**with some of the stuff being edited to fit my character's actions. There will be three original Spartan-II's. However, only one of them is actually an OC. One is taken from another game, I'll give credit where credit is due, and the other is...well...I'll let you guess. Next chapter though. They don't show up till chapter 2. I'll post one final author's note to A Spartan's Exile before I take it down in about a week. It has been sitting and collecting dust in the part of crossovers that is hardly ever visited. It's called Red vs Blue and Halo crossovers. So yeah, enough of me. Enjoy this short chapter of Lieutenant Keyes and Doctor Halsey.  
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**Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Halo. I wish I did. Halo is property of 343 Industries. All I own is every Halo game except for Spartan Assault, a Halo 4 Champions Bundle poster that I got from RTX '13, _The Fall of Reach, The Ghosts of Onyx,_ and _The__ Thursday War_.**

**0430 Hours, August 22, 2517 (Military Calendar)/ Slipstream space- unknown coordinates near Luna**

Lieutenant Junior Grade Jacob Keyes awoke. Dull red light filled his blurry vision and he choked on the slime in his throat and lungs.

"Sit up, Lieutenant Keyes," a disembodied male voice said. "Sit. Take a deep breath and cough, sir. You need to clear the bronchial surfactant."

Lieutenant Keyes pushed himself up, peeling his back off the form fitting gel bed. Wisps of fog overflowed from the cryogenic tube as he clumsily climbed out. He sat on a nearby bench, tried to inhale, and doubled over, coughing until a long string of clear fluid flowed from his open mouth. He sat up and drew his first full breath in two weeks. He tasted his lips and almost gagged. No matter how many times he did this he would never get used to the lime flavored mucus taste of the supposedly nutrient rich fluids.

"Status, Toran?"

"Status normal," the ship's AI replied. "We will reach Luna in twenty-three minutes."

"Good. Thank you, Toran."

"You're welcome, Lieutenant."

Luna was far from the Eridanus Star System, their previous location. Luna orbited Earth in the Inner Colonies.

Wake-up protocols dictated that he inspect the rest of the crew to make sure no one ran into any problems reviving.

He looked around the sleep chamber: rows of stainless steel lockers and showers, a medical pod for emergency resuscitations, and forty cryogenic tubes-all empty except the one on his left. The other person on the _Han _was the civilian specialist, Dr. Halsey. Keyes had been ordered to protect her at all costs, pilot this ship, and generally stay the hell out of her way. He still didn't understand what they were doing. Well, he understood what they were doing, evaluating children for something, he just didn't understand _why _they were doing it.

The cover of Dr. Halsey's tube hummed open. MIst rippled out as she sat up, coughing. Her pale skin made her look like a ghost in the fog. Matted locks of dark hair clung to her neck. Her blue eyes fixed upon the Lieutenant, and she looked him over. "We must be near Luna." she said.

"Yes, Doctor." Keyes nodded. She swung her legs out of the tube and climbed out.

"Get cleaned up and dressed," she strode past him to the showers. "Hurry. Remember, we have important work to do."

Lieutenant Keyes stood straighter. "Aye, aye, Ma'am."

**XXX**

The bridge of the _Han_ had an abundance of space for a vessel of its size. That is, it had all the maneuvering room of a walk-in closet. A freshly showered, shaved, and uniformed Lieutenant Keyes pulled himself into the room and sealed the pressure door behind him. Every surface of the bridge was covered with monitors and screens. The wall on his left was a single large semi curved view screen, dark for the moment because there was nothing in the visible spectrum to see in slipspace.

Behind him was the _Han_'s spinning center section, containing the mess, the rec room, and the sleep chambers. There was no gravity on the bridge, however. The diplomatic shuttle had been designed for the comfort of its passengers, not the crew.

It didn't seem to bother Dr. Halsey. Strapped into the navigator's couch, she wore a white jumpsuit that matched her pale skin, and had tied her dark hair into a simple, elegant knot. Her fingers danced across four keypads, tapping in commands.

"Welcome, Lieutenant," she said without looking up. "Please have a seat at the communication station and monitor the channels when we enter normal space. If there's so much as a squeak on the non standard frequencies, I want to know instantly. Same deal as Eridanus. It's highly unlikely that we would pick up any this close to Earth, but it never hurts to be cautious. "

He drifted to the communication station and strapped himself down.

"Entering normal space in five minutes, plus or minus three minutes." the ship AI said.

"Who are we looking for this time, Ma'am?" Keyes asked.

"This time we are looking at two six-year-old males and a five-year-old male. They seem to be rather inseparable. Although, the youngest boy seems to be more of a lone wolf when in the presence of more than just the three of them."

With a sudden deceleration, they entered normal space. The main view screen flickered and a million stars snapped into focus. The Earth, the birthplace of the Human race, was visible off to their left. The _Han_ angled towards a white ball of rock orbiting the Earth.

"Stand by for burn," Dr. Halsey announced. "On my mark, Toran."

Lieutenant Keyes tightened his harness.

"Three...two...one. _Mark_."

The ship rumbled and sped faster toward the ball of rock. The pull of the harness increased around the Lieutenant's chest, making breathing difficult. They accelerated for sixty-seven seconds. Luna drifted into the center of the view screen and filled the bridge with cold white light.

"Gravity boost complete," Toran chimed. "ETA to Luna is thirty minutes, four seconds."

"Well done," Dr. Halsey said. She unlocked her harness and floated free, stretching. "Have I mentioned that I hate cryosleep?" she asked. "It leaves one so cramped." she turned her back to the Lieutenant and once again began typing into the keyboards.

"Approaching Luna." Toran informed them.

"Plot an atmospheric vector for the Luna spaceport," Dr. Halsey ordered. "Lieutenant Keyes, make ready to land."


End file.
